Socioeconomic dualism: the case of Israeli-born immigrants in the United States.

Relying on the 1980 US Census of Foreign-Born Population and the 1979 Immigration and Naturalization Service Public Use File, this article compares Israeli-born Americans (including Arabs) to both the US and Israeli populations with respect to age, marital status, unemployment, education, industry, occupation, and income as of 1979-1980. Some of the results, mainly those pertaining to the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of Israeli immigrants as compared to their society of origin, corroborate previous research. Thus, Israeli-born immigrants in the US held top white-collar jobs and were less likely to be unemployed than the rest of the Israeli labor force. Once in America, however, it seems that not all Israeli-born Americans are as successful as portrayed by past research. In fact, the Census data reveal occupational and economic dualism among the population of Israeli-born Americans. The reasons for this dualism are discussed.